


Both Sides of the Fence

by AndreaLyn



Category: The West Wing
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-09
Updated: 2014-08-09
Packaged: 2018-02-12 12:10:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2109414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndreaLyn/pseuds/AndreaLyn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ainsley wants to know why Congressman Matt Skinner is acting the way he is. Sam's a spokesman for the people.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Both Sides of the Fence

It was nothing new for Ainsley to find people in the halls of the West Wing at night. For one, she was always there. Something about nighttime was much better for her (if only that the Steampipe Distribution Venue cooled to a temperature fit for normal humans at that time). As the days became closer and closer to December, her office only got hotter and hotter and now that it was the end of November, she was about to end a perilous territory of sweating and heatstroke in the middle of winter in  _Washington_  of all places.  
  
It was on her way out that she actually bumped right into Congressman Matt Skinner, looking like he was more angry at that moment than anything else in the world.  
  
“Matt?” Ainsley asked curiously.  
  
Friends of a feather had to stick together, or some other weird saying that her Dad always used to parrot to Ainsley. In this case, the Republicans who worked with the White House definitely had to stick together. Even if the rumors about Matt kept circulating and his chances of re-election spiralled towards non-existence.   
  
But Matt didn’t even turn around and when Ainsley spun to continue to get herself a muffin, she found herself face to…well, chest, with Sam, lit by shadows in the darkened hallways of the West Wing.  
  
“What’s wrong with Ma…Congressman Skinner?” Ainsley wondered, completely lost. She hadn’t just missed her line. She’d missed all of Act One, at this rate.  
  
Sam didn’t answer, just eased his hands into his pockets as he stared down at Ainsley. “Did you want to get a drink?”  
  
“With you?” Ainsley asked dubiously.  
  
“No, Ainsley, with the President of the Homeowners Association,” Sam retorted, his tone clipped. “Yes, of course with me. I’m asking. This is me asking and even offering to pay. Like a gentleman.”  
  
Something was up, but she didn’t say a word.  
  
“Okay. But only if you’re paying for the food too.”  
  
By the look Sam gave her in return, she knew she was pushing the limits, but as far as Ainsley was concerned, a blooming onion could definitely solve that problem with a few beers to knock back.   
  
*  
  
They went to a bar just down the street where the co-eds sometimes went and Sam related to Ainsley that they brought Zoey there once until there was trouble with the Secret Service and CJ was ordering drinks that hadn’t been served in decades and decades. He relayed this to her distractedly while he sipped a beer and she enjoyed a deep-fried plate of cheese sticks. And a pink drink of her own that Sam kept sipping at, actually. “I didn’t know they still  _made_  grasshoppers,” Ainsley remarked, completely wowed by that, if nothing else. “I wonder if they’d make me one.”  
  
“Easy, Gracie,” Sam said, giving her a dubious look. “Or should I remind you of what happened the  _last_  time you knocked back a few too many.”  
  
“I was on an adrenaline high, Sam,” was her very even retort in a voice that some might even call kittenish. “What do you do when you have an adrenaline high?”  
  
“Well, I wait until the high goes away and then I’m not on adrenaline and I  _don’t_  do stupid things in front of the President of the United States.” He gave her that infuriatingly innocent ‘I am Sam Seaborn, no woman can stay mad at me’ look and Ainsley managed to roll her eyes as she stole her drink back to sip at it. “Besides, at least you didn’t make an idiot out of yourself in front of Leo’s  _daughter_.”  
  
“Oh, Sam,” Ainsley said, pursing her lips. “Of all the things you could have done to all the people in the world, that had to be one of the most embarrassing things a person could ever, effectively, do.”  
  
“You definitely don’t have to tell me twice,” he scoffed.  
  
Ainsley  _almost_  brought up the call girl, but she decided it was probably time to switch the subject to the one that had been bothering her the whole time. “What was wrong with Matt Skinner?” she asked, bluntly.   
  
“You mean besides him being in the wrong party?” Sam suggested, very cheerfully.  
  
Her response wasn’t even in words, but in glare-form.  
  
“Oh, come on,” he snapped back. “I understand your… _thing_  with being a devoted and loyal Republican, but Matt is surrounded by people who can’t stand who he is, what he does, the lifestyle he’s chosen, and the future he wants,” Sam argued, ticking each one off on his fingers. “And because he agrees with…what, some wayward percentage of their policies over ours, he chooses to be  _ridiculed_ ,  _slandered_  and  **hated**  for it.”  
  
“Sam, that is an awfully high soapbox you’re standing on,” Ainsley noted patiently. “How about you step off it for a second and stop giving me the Scarlet Letter of Partisanship for a while.” Like  _she_  would do that to her own party. She watched him for a long moment as she picked up the menu again to see just what else she could order since Sam was picking up the bill. When the waiter next came around, Ainsley had flagged him down to try the deep-fried shrimp platter, but then, of course, Sam had her undivided attention.  
  
“You’re unbelievable sometimes,” he said, but it was mostly awe in his voice.  
  
“That I know, Sam,” Ainsley replied, charming as ever. “Now, what is going on with Matt?”  
  
“A while back, when the President was in Portland, Josh met with Matt to discuss a bill that the President eventually put away.”  
  
“Except now it’s coming back out,” Ainsley finished the story, wincing just a little at her choice of words, which seemed to amuse Sam, by the way he was smiling at her. “Oh, shut up,” she iterated a snappy retort immediately.   
  
“I didn’t say anything,” Sam replied lightly.  
  
“You were thinking it.”  
  
Sam shrugged, a graceful lift and fall of his shoulder that showed that yes, yes he had been thinking it, but Ainsley was moving on to the newly arrived plate of food as she tried to get her head wrapped around the issue again. “So why is Matt so angry now?” She couldn’t put that piece together. It wasn’t going on the floor of any house of government anytime  _soon_.   
  
“Well, it’s November 27th,” Sam pointed out, like that explained everything.  
  
“Yes,” Ainsley agreed, not sure what that was supposed to mean. “Yes, it is. And incredibly, tomorrow is the 28th.”  
  
Sam took a second to realize that she had  _no_  idea what he meant, so he leaned forward, eyebrows raising towards his hairline. “November 27th? Pretty big in the Gay and Lesbian community.”  
  
“Don’t forget bisexuals, Sam,” she said, very patiently, but mostly to see what kind of reaction that would get.  
  
“Ainsley…”  
  
“Fine, go on,” she said, rolling her eyes at the little growl. Men, honestly. You could wind them up like a toy and set their course and they’d take you to task for it. “What is so very important about tomorrow and why is Matt so angry about it?”  
  
“Back in seventy-eight,” Sam launched into the history lesson with so much ease that Ainsley almost got sick from the spin. “There was a man named Harvey Milk down in San Fran, activist for the LGBT community.”  
  
Ainsley nodded when he paused for air, twirling her wrist to encourage him onwards.  
  
“Well, see, he was  _shot_ , Ainsley, assassinated for his beliefs.”   
  
She was watching him critically, looking for a tell, because Sam Seaborn was very invested in all of his causes. Sometimes, though, he was  _too_ invested for personal reasons and this one smelled a bit like that. He went on and on, describing the scene, the day, the reaction.   
  
“…he wanted to help and break the homosexual stereotype. I find that admirable,” Sam said, finishing up his beer and signalling the waiter for a check. Ainsley had gone into quiet and thoughtful mode, which really only ever happened before she assaulted with a strike and Sam knew as much, because he was looking at her warily. “You’re never quiet this long. What are you about to say?” he asked, very, very worried.   
  
“I think you have a personal stake in this,” she said, wielding her fork as she went about eating from the appetizer in front of her. “But I can’t tell what, yet. Have you ever been to San Francisco, Sam?”  
  
“Once.”  
  
“It’s a very pretty city and there’s an inscription to Mr. Milk at City Hall that I once saw, which is very thoughtful and touching, but see, Sam, Congressman Skinner has a source for frustration here because that is something that touches his beliefs, his very core beliefs, and exposes them as fears of how things might end. Could you imagine being out and in Congress as a  _Republican_?” she demanded, leaning forward. “Could you even imagine?” A long, long moment of her staring at him, unflinching, she decided to ask. “Or can you?”  
  
“Ainsley…”  
  
“It’s just a question, Sam,” she said, completely innocent.  
  
“Ainsley, this is…”  
  
“Why do you care so much?”  
  
“Because I’m the guy who cares,” Sam snapped. “Because while this administration is stuck doing nothing, I’m the one who…who…”  
  
“Why do you care?” she asked again, softer this time. Because there had to be something. Just because it happened in history and a current bill reflected the very ideals behind tomorrow’s events didn’t mean Sam should care so much, unless he had his honor or something alike on the line. “Because Sam, this is an issue that’s been out there and will stay out there and it won’t go away.”  
  
He was stirring his beer, looking into it and appearing very troubled. “It was one spring break. Just one, me and Josh were in California.”  
  
Ainsley stared at Sam in shock, trying to anticipate what was coming next. It couldn’t  _possibly_  be what she was expecting because the papers would have gotten hold of it already. “Sam…” He was busy rubbing his hands over his face, which only meant that there was more to this story. “Sam, did you and Josh ever…”  
  
“Once. Once and it was in California and it was Spring Break and we go to this museum the next day and Josh read all this stuff about the assassination and he just lost it and we broke up before anything ever happened, which was  _definitely_  for the best.” His look was threatening as he glanced at her. “Ainsley, if I see this in a paper…”  
  
“You won’t,” she interrupted in a hurry. “North Carolinian’s Honor,” she swore as she crossed her heart.   
  
“So yeah. Josh freaked because of what it meant in this country to like other men and now Congressman Skinner is upset because our administration can’t veto this bill without sparking a huge turf war and tomorrow, Harvey Milk was assassinated twenty four years ago and that’s what’s wrong with Matt Skinner.”  
  
“Sam…”  
  
“Nothing’s changed, Ainsley,” Sam said, bitterly as he signed the bill when it came. “For all our strides into the future, for all our improved rights, nothing really has changed when everyone is still too scared, when Southern states are still too prejudiced and when our administration is still too _gutless_ ,” he said, clipped.  
  
Ainsley had risen to her feet, sliding into her jacket and brushing her hair off the back of the black trench. “Sam, come home with me,” she ordered him, very simply. “Come home with me and have drinks and tell me all about it.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because I want to hear,” she informed him, extending a gloved hand, wiggling her fingers as she tugged on the object. “And who else would give you an offer like that without a rider saying they get to mock you for it?”  
  
Sam took her hand hesitantly, giving it a warm squeeze as he did.  
  
“Ainsley,” he started.  
  
“Don’t say it, Sam,” she commanded, leading him out into the brisk November air where she would take him back to her place for funny pink drinks and commiseration. And maybe the bill would never leave the drawer, but she knew that something had changed; if nothing else, perceptions would. Slowly but surely.  
  
 _If a flower should enter my brain, let that flower destroy every closet door._


End file.
